Monthly Archives: February 2012

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The City of Portland Archives has this image in its land use files but the location is not noted. Somewhere along NE Alberta Street in 1962 is about all that’s known. Can anybody lead us to the location of this corner market? Is it still standing?

What looks like a swath of tornado damage in the lower center of this 1964 image actually shows the beginning of demolition for the Stadium Freeway (I-405). Many more blocks will fall to the wrecker as the freeway turns north and cuts between SW 13th and 14th on its route to Northwest Portland. For orientation, we’re looking northwest with the diagonal SW Broadway between Lincoln and Grant Streets at the very bottom.

Portland street crews work on N. Interstate Avenue in this 1950 photo. We’re looking northwest; Interstate curves around to the right and N. Russell Street is just around the corner. Harding Avenue comes in from the left and Larrabee continues straight ahead toward the railroad yards; the Union Pacific smokestack can be seen behind the tree on the right. The little burger joint straight ahead is on the northwest corner of Larrabee and Russell and would be under the edge of the Fremont Bridge today.

Pretty sketchy information on this at the University of Oregon Libraries source. The undated photo is supposed to be the “Dr. Chapman house” originally at Front & Market, then Front & Sherman. Sanborn maps confirms this is the southeast corner of Front & Sherman. I’m pretty sure the apartment building in the background on the left edge is the same wavy-floored building shown here; roof details match and Sanborn maps show a 4-story “tenements” building at this location.

The Roma Importing Co. and Delicatessen at SW Sheridan and 4th Avenue was probably a South Portland neighborhood mainstay back in its day. It would soon be demolished as part of the South Auditorium Urban Renewal Area project of the early 1960s. This view is east on Sheridan. The same building and intersection can be seen in this aerial view from 1934.

The City of Portland Archives has images of locations that are unknown or just generally known and would like to better identify them for its database. Vintage Portland will feature some of these photos periodically with the hope that the knowledgeable VP community will help in that quest.

Today we show two photos from land use records of Southeast Portland’s Brooklyn neighborhood from 1963. Can you nail down the precise location of these two images? Comment early and comment often!